Judge Orders DACA Restart

A federal judge ordered the Homeland Security Department to start accepting new applications for the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program, effective August 23rd. The delayed effective date is intended to give the Administration time to appeal his ruling.

Judge John Bates of the D.C. Circuit Court also denied a motion to reconsider his earlier decision to restart DACA. He issued a 90-day stay of his ruling in April to give the Administration time to fully explain why it terminated the program. “The court has already once given DHS the opportunity to remedy these deficiencies — either by providing a coherent explanation of its legal opinion or by reissuing its decision for bona fide policy reasons that would preclude judicial review,” he said. “So it will not do so again.”

In June DHS Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen issued a memo reaffirming the original rationale for termination. Bates said that memo offered “nothing even remotely approaching a considered legal assessment that this court could subject to judicial review.”

The administration must accept new applications from DACA-eligible aliens on August 23rd unless an appeals court stays Bates’ ruling or he alters it.

Responding to the ruling, Attorney General Jeff Sessions said, “The judicial branch has no power to eviscerate the lawful directives of Congress—nor to enjoin the executive branch from enforcing such mandates…This ignores the wisdom of our Founders and transfers policy making questions from the constitutionally empowered and politically accountable branches to the judicial branch. It also improperly undermines this Administration’s ability to protect our nation, its borders, and its citizens. The Trump Administration and this Department of Justice will continue to aggressively defend the executive branch’s lawful authority and duty to ensure a lawful system of immigration for our country.”

Read more in Politico.